Autopilot Wingman Mode for Bomber Formations

[shoresroad]

I wonder who put these crazy ideas into your head badger!   

You did, Fish

Fish lead the first of these missions I had ever flew, and now I can't get enough  

[shoresroad]

Shores,  fine summary 

Thanks, Hap

[shoresroad]

Will Harry not be dropping directly onto Pete?

Harry and Pete were in the high and low rear positions for defensive purposes during transit:

"Now the formation is nearing their target and they want to level the city at the strats or some other target.  Harry and Pete swing out of their high and low rear positions and take positions to the left and right of Tom and Dick."

And this is just one example.  I've been looking at WWII bomber formations on the web and there are many options depending on the number of pilots available for the mission.

[shoresroad]

Sounds to me like the strats wont be receiving much damage. Carpet bombing will not be effective, except for the few bombs that may find a target. My suggestion is to use it how the rest of the players in the game use it, and that is to get to target. Once, you are at the target for the love of god have everyone calibrate and drop on individual targets and meet up after runs.(unless you will be bombing my strats feel free to carpet bomb)

Hi John,

You're right, there will be times where carpet bombing will not be the answer and instead each pilot can take control of their planes for precision bombing also, but still enjoy the defensive advantage of formation flying in transit to and from the target.

[shoresroad]

Nice write up shore.

Thanks, ROC

[shoresroad]

You mean the defensive fire of 15 B-17s. Players bring 3 each.

And this is my problem with the auto formation function. Buff guns are already way over effective. Drones were added to strengthen the defensive power of a single player and in addition giving him "3 strikes" before he gets the short trip to the tower. Combine drones formation with player auto formation and you get one ridiculous flying ack cloud. What started as a combat flight sim has shifted into too many things that do not include flying. Now even a bomber pilot does not actually fly his bomber, but slave them to another player. He is basically a gunner that brought 3 (3, not 2) drones with him.

I don't think this will turn into indestructible death star formations.  I was in a formation of seven B-26's (21 planes) that was completely destroyed by interceptors.  Some interceptors have cannons that can reach out and kill bombers beyond the effective range of the bomber's guns.  What I think this does is level the playing field and add an element of realism.  IRL the bombers had pilots to hold the formations together and gunners to fight.  In AH it is often hard to find folks to fly in the gunner position only.  So as pilots go to their guns the formations drift apart, and once the formations have separated there are many fighter pilots that can make an easy meal of a single formation of three, not to mention multiple interceptors.  Bomber pilots don't up their bombers to become kills, they want to come home

What I think this could mean is a whole lot of fun!  These big formations show a big dar bar over multiple sectors which can attract many interceptors.  The formations also need escort fighters to knock down the 410's sitting out there at 1.5k sniping one bomber after another.  I have been on some large missions which have become epic battles at 20k, with interceptors tearing through the formations with escorts in pursuit and guns blazing everywhere.  In the end the mission is not destroyed but heavily damaged with maybe a 50% loss of pilots and drones, but also many interceptors and escorts shot down and hopefully fun for all

This also makes missions with the lessor bombers like the He111 and Betty more feasible.  Right now a lone formation of He111's is often cannon fodder.  A formation of 10 He111 pilots (30 He111's) tucked in tight together with a few escorts would be a different story.  So hopefully we will see the use of lessor bombers more often in the MA now that we have this feature.  I'm certainly going to up these types of formations for some variety and challenge

On the other side of the equation, I watched a large formation of over 20 B-24's and B-17's on a strat run recently.  They weren't holding tight formations, and almost none, if any, returned home as they were slowly picked away at by fighters all the way there and back.

I guess we'll have to wait and see.  I doubt there will be enough interest in large bomber formations to sway the balance of power in the MA dramatically towards bombers.  But it might make life more interesting for bomber pilots and fighter pilots to boot when they do appear!

Badger

[shoresroad]

Great Post!! That's the kind of post we need more of in this forum! Clear and to the point!

Thanks, Earl

[shoresroad]

nice write up badger! Enjoyed reading it. 

 

Thanks, Blu

[Mongoose]

  At first I thought this feature was kind of "gamey".  But after seeing this explanation, I can see how it does mimic what would be flown in real life.  U.S. bombers adopted the tactic of flying in formations which maximized the protective firepower of group working together.  This new feature allows you to use that same tactic. 

  Now it's up to us fighter pilots to put up a good fight.   

[muzik]

I have been on some large missions which have become epic battles at 20k, with interceptors tearing through the formations with escorts in pursuit and guns blazing everywhere. 

  At first I thought this feature was kind of "gamey".  But after seeing this explanation, I can see how it does mimic what would be flown in real life. 

WOW, what a cool and fun feature this sounds like. Who'd have thought.

I think something was accidentally overlooked though. It should have been more like this...



Where pilots choose a place in the formation, slot 1, 2, 3...

Or fighters choose their slots from formations like these...

[wpeters]

One thing is that fighter pilots forget is to successfully live through a large engagement with bombers is to have 3 or more planes attack the bomber formation at the same time. Preferably  4 flight elements.  2 elements attacking from a high four and eight o'clock and two attacking from low four and eight positions. This means the bombers SA will deteriorate at a rapid speed. Radio chatter will be over run with many call and gunners will be confused on whom to fire. Ultimately what this means is you will have 2 fighters attacking from the high 8 and 2 fighters attacking from the low eight etc with the 4 o'clock position. Fighters should achieve at least 350mph for blow through of formation. Also attack should be timed for max SA degeneration. Now lone wolf should try this. There is a reason that wolves live in packs same here 

[shoresroad]

Thanks for posting the bomber formation diagram, Muzik

I have seen this diagram and hopefully as we get better we can run formations like this!  I know that will be the goal of my squad in the long run (of course depending on the number of pilots we have participating in the mission).

Badger

[shoresroad]

For those interested, here is the new Squad Recruiting Thread for the Rough Puppies:

http://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/index.php/topic,351824.0.html

Badger

[muzik]

Thanks for posting the bomber formation diagram, Muzik

I have seen this diagram and hopefully as we get better we can run formations like this!  I know that will be the goal of my squad in the long run (of course depending on the number of pilots we have participating in the mission).

Badger

No problem. Hopefully someday it wont be so tedious to get into formation if Htc adds formation patterns that allow players to just choose a slot when nearly in position.

Formations will look better an more professional. It would be cool if some day, the gaggles were in nice formations the majority of the time. It would certainly make a better impression on new players.

Have they worked out the bugs in the formation system yet?

[shoresroad]

Now for the fighters - how to attack such a formation?

Hopefully, if all 3 bombers of the leader are destroyed, the formation will start to disperse, especially if they were tilted when the last of the leader bombers died. I doubt they will be very fast in assigning a new leader and activating the auto formation on him.

Update:

This did become a problem so we now operate in sections within a single formation.  For example, in the case of 9 bomber pilots in a formation the Section 1 leader has 2 pilots attached to his left and right flanks.  The Section 2 leader (following and attached to the Section 1 leader) has 2 pilots attached to his left and right flanks.  The Section 3 leader (following and attached to the Section 2 leader) has 2 pilots attached to his left and right flanks. This gives us a formation 3 pilots abreast and 3 pilots deep (3 x 3) that is quit formidable.  We try to keep the formation symmetrical regardless of the number of bomber pilots as we have found that a symmetrical formation provides the best defensive protection with no outliers to be singled out.

With this chain of command within the formation there is very little chaos if a section leader loses all three planes, and there is an immediate response to who's next in command with easy re-attachment by orphaned pilots to maintain formation integrity.

Does this create a "deathstar."  No, but rather parity from what I've seen, and we can create and maintain some nifty 8th AAF style formations.  We tend to bring home about 50% of the bomber pilots who set off on raids with us (less with smaller formations and more with larger formations).  I think HiTech did a great job in adding this feature as it gives organized bomber pilots a 50/50 chance of surviving a Strat raid rather than becoming nom-noms as is often the case in less organized raids, in particular going in at 25k looking for a fight in addition to dropping bombs.

Badger